


Your Silver Lining

by rowofstars



Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Episode 1, F/M, Gen, Season 8, Spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-08-25
Updated: 2014-08-25
Packaged: 2018-02-14 16:42:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 594
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2199261
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rowofstars/pseuds/rowofstars
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Doctor is different, but so is Clara.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Your Silver Lining

**Author's Note:**

> This is not my first DW fic rodeo, but it's my first time writing either of these characters. Comments are always appreciated.

If he can change, the sodding prick, then so can _I_ , she thinks.

She nearly chokes on her words as they trip over the lump and rising taste of bile in her throat, but it does the trick. The clockwork man stops and seems to reconsider, buying her more time to avoid becoming another set of spare parts. The smell of the slowly rotting flesh turns her stomach.

The Doctor left her, again, and yet she wants to believe he’ll be there, right behind her just as soon as she needs him to be. He is felt rather than seen, at first, a booming presence that is always larger than he really is, moving swiftly and confidently to deal with their enemy. But the breath she lets out at the sound of his voice is relief all the same.

She wonders if she’ll ever stop wanting to believe in him.

 

 

Later, she catches herself looking at him, like she needs the reminder, and everything is just too new right now to make sense. Maybe it would be easier if the TARDIS was the same, but he changed that too, and the clash of blue and red is unnerving. Last night it had taken her ages to fall asleep, restless and straining to make out sounds that were vaguely familiar but too strange to place properly.

The phone call was expected, by him at least, and she should be angry about that, but all she really feels is a sad, hollow loss. He was there asking her to see him as if she hadn't been trying to all along, like she ever could at all.

She doesn't know how to deal with any of this, this Doctor who is not her Doctor, but still is anyway. He’s all lean, hard lines, and cold blue eyes. He doesn't smile, doesn't reach for her; he just stands in an exasperated sort of way, waiting.

She wants to scream at him that she’s right here too.

It’s then that he catches her eyes across the console, and there’s some sort of odd reassurance there that makes her smile. His mouth twists and it’s still not quite a smile but it’s definitely sly and irresponsible, and for the first time she feels like she really knows it’s him. He moves more gracefully than she remembers, the back of his long coat flowing out behind him as he turns, the flash of red lining yet another thing she has to get used to like this strange space between them, a proximity that is and isn't.

So she listens to the buzzing around her, the hum and spin and turn of the TARDIS, and that, at least, still feels right.

He turns again, and she is brave enough to catch his hand, wrap her fingers into his palm, and smile when he stops mid step.

“Clara, I –,” he stops as soon as he starts, curling his long fingers against hers in spite of himself.

“I see you,” she says, knowing rather than feeling that’s what he needs to hear.

It takes a moment for him to recover and return to flipping switches and twisting knobs, but then there he is again, watching her without really watching her, looking without looking, as if he too needs the reminder.

The time rotor groans to life, pulsing blue and green. A tingle creeps up her spine, she feels that telltale rush of excitement and energy and everything coming together at once, her, her echoes, and him.

And there she is, wanting to believe again.


End file.
